The invention relates to a method for causing one electronic messaging service system to migrate towards another, and to apparatus for implementing said method.
A field of application for the invention relates to deployment, including international deployment, of messaging service systems of large entities, such as large firms.
Currently, numerous messaging service systems exist such as Exchange®, and Notes® (registered trademarks), to mention but the most well known.
Although the same messaging service system makes it possible to manage a large number of electronic messaging service mailboxes, migration of said mailboxes from one messaging service system to another different or identical messaging service system is not without difficulties.
To achieve such migration, it is necessary to co-ordinate properly the tasks executed on the server(s) of the first messaging service system that is to migrate towards the second messaging service system, and the tasks executed on the server(s) of the second messaging service system. It can also be difficult to synchronize the parameterization of the workstations at the time at which the messaging service migrates. During the migration, each technician in charge of performing one of the tasks must obtain information from the other technicians involved about the state of progress of the other tasks, and must wait for the other technicians to confirm that said other tasks have been performed properly in order for the technician to start his or her own task.
In spite of the numerous possibilities offered to all of the players involved for communicating between themselves, be it through physical meetings or through modern communications means, the extraordinary difficulty of genuinely synchronizing the tasks of the players usually means that the messaging services are shut down completely for at least one weekend during which said tasks are performed. This results in a period during which the mailboxes that are to migrate are unavailable. For example, the mailboxes that are to migrate do not receive the messages that are sent during that period of unavailability to the first messaging service system hosting them, even though such messages are addressed to them.